I found an old CD of Mandrake 8.1 in my collection so I installed it. Somehow after restart its X11 did not function so I put in the RHEL CD1 and reloaded it without selecting any packages and no hdd formatting except delete the new Mandrake partition.
It loaded smoothly and I found my system intact but the modem would not get detected. So the modem was uninstalled using rpm -e package_name. Then the rpm was reinstalled. Now the KPPP (with its existing settings) opens up the websites and email without going through the ritual of first starting 'Network Device Control'. This is strange but I am happy.
Regards,
Rony.